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I currently use the reloader 19 in my 280. it goes from .477" groups to 2.5" groups. depending on the weather. That's the reason I am trying 4350 with some berger bullets. Love the nosler accubonds but am curious to see how the bergers perform on deer and if I am lucky enough elk.

Colorado Cowboy
Cowboy Action Shooter; Endowment Life Member-NRA
The Original Rocket Scientist-Retired
"My Father always considered a walk in the mountains as the equivalent of church going."
Aldous Huxley

yes so far that I have noticed. I do know I am looking for a bedding job to be done on my rifle. just to rule that out. I love the accuracy and the velocities I get with the rel 19 and my accubonds. Them bullets are my go to bullet unless the bergers prove me wrong, there just finicky bastards to load.

I've reloaded, built custom rifles and generally experimented in shooting all kinds of rifles, pistols and shotguns for over 50 years. Most shooters don't take the time to do the research, reading and expermintation to understand that most guns can be very different from another one produced off the same assembly line. All the machined parts can be very different from each other.. Accumulation of machining tolerances are there and when we try to make every rifle as accurate as a custom benchrest rifle it shows up. IMHO this is why each rifle shoots a particular combination of bullet, powder and primer better than another combo. This particular combo may not shoot well at all in another rifle of the same mfg and caliber. There are just too many variables present...even without the shooter being involved!

Didn't mean to get too far off the subject, but a little understanding of the problems that can be encountered IMHO were in order. Today a lot of shooters (and hunters too) are expecting and demanding performance that in a lot of cases is impossible from a lot of rifles. Some of the gun, ammunition and component suppliers realize this and are doing at great job of meeting our expectations without breaking the bank. Savage is a good example.

Keep working, testing and shooting. Its fun and you will eventually figure out what works best for you.

Colorado Cowboy
Cowboy Action Shooter; Endowment Life Member-NRA
The Original Rocket Scientist-Retired
"My Father always considered a walk in the mountains as the equivalent of church going."
Aldous Huxley

I can weigh in a little on how Berger VLD hunting bullets perform in the 140gr weight at similar velocity. I've taken several whitetail and antelope with them from my 264 win mag loaded to 2950fps. In short they perform exactly as advertised. They have a small entry, often hard to spot from the outside on a fatter animal as they seal up. They penetrate 2-3" and then rapidly fragment. I've yet to shoot anything real big with them, but nothing I've shot with them has made it over 40yds. I took a neighbor's son out last night and he got his first deer at 212yds and it went only 40yds setting the new record. The lungs, top of the heart, and even the guts were heavily damaged on a good center lung shot from the massive expansion. There was an exit wound this time, something I see about half the time, of about 3". A friend who was along last fall when we took 3 antelope with my rifle between 175 and 351yds describes their performance as a grenade going off as soon as they get inside the ribcage.

The good about the Berger is that they do massive internal damage and shut deer size game down quick, even with a shot a little to far back. The bad is that the tiny entrance wound seldom bleeds much if at all and they don't exit half the time making blood trails iffy. This has never been a problem for me because the animal never makes it far enough to need the blood trail, but it still makes me a little nervous to be honest. I've used them in 87gr (Berger chose me as one of their testers) and 95gr 6mm, plus the 140gr 6.5mm and have never seen one fail on big game or had one run far, but I've seen absolutely no blood on the outside of an animal after a hit that didn't exit.

Another negative I've seen is the smaller ones failing to open fast enough to kill a coyote quick if that matters to you. 2-3" is pretty deep into a broadside coyote, and if fragmentation doesn't start until then the yote can run quite a ways after the hit I've seen. Probably why Berger also makes varmint bullets and designates these two as hunting bullets not varmint bullets. Accubonds actually work better for yotes because their expansion starts on contact more dramatically and they usually go right down. Seating depth can be tricky for Bergers too especially when trying to fit a magazine. When I had my 264 built I had a Wyatt extended box installed to get around the magazine length problem. I tried loading all Berger's recommended seating depths and never got the gun to shoot sub MOA. I then switched to the 140gr accubond and got good loads right off. Out of curiosity I tried putting Bergers on top of my accubond load and instantly went to sub 1/2" groups at a seating depth quite a bit deeper than Berger recommends. I still use that load, not the hottest but it sure works fine.

Again I like both bullets real well once I figured out where to use which one. I currently only use the Berger in the 264 and use the Accubond in all my other big game or big game/coyote rifles. On the windy plains and hills that I hunt where shots can stretch out I really appreciate the decreased wind drift and drop for longer shots using the Berger. When hunting bigger game or with smaller calibers I tend to lean toward the accubond. I really want to get to testing the new 150gr accubond long range in all my rifles now that it's starting to show up, it may be the best of both worlds.

I don't have a .280 Rem. I wish I did. Had I been as smart as I knew I was when I began rifle buying I would have bought a .280 & saved money that went to rifles and used it for hunting. To my way of looking at cartridges, the .280 Rem is as good as it gets.

I do own a 7MM Rem Mag. Based upon what I've read and have been told, a .280 can be handloaded to close to the equivalent of the 7MM Rem Mag, within a couple hundred FPS. I don't think any big game animal is going to notice such a minor velocity differential, which narrows at impact.

The 280 Remington is a fabulous cartridge in standard for or in the .280 AI. In my .280 Remington I used 140 gr. Nosler Partitions and I also think the 140 gr. Accubonds would be a fantastic bullet in it. I would suggest bullets from 140-160 grs. and shoot the one your rifle likes the best.

My load is 54.0 grs. of IMR4350. It is just a little over what the Nosler book calls for but my case life is great and there are no pressure signs. I played a bit with H4831SC and it too seems to be a really good powder for this cartridge. I killed my largest bull with my .280 at 250 yards!! You cannot go wrong with a .280 Remington!! David

I'm enjoying my 280 so far. I'm still working on some loads. I've tried some hornadys, accubonds, partitions, and burgers all in the 140-160 grains range. So far my gun seems to like the nosler products best and I liked the accubonds expansion and weight retention from the few bullets I did recover. Now that my hunting season is wrapped up for the year, except for some predator control, I'll get back to trying to fine tune some loads.

Overall working up different loads is new to me so I'm going pretty slow with my science experiment. I'm getting 100yd groups of about an inch and some of that is me as I haven't had the trigger time lately that I would like to be putting in. But I plan to change that this winter and get a solid load I like and me back into rifle shooting shape.......hopefully it won't mess my archery up. I've been doing great out to 75yds.